[Johnny Brown]

To derail the discussion even more... grades! Is 'Belly full of bad berries' E8 while No way josé is E7? And why? The latter was flashed by Restrorp in 2011.

I can’t see any rationale for giving well-protected US pure crack climbs E grades. The YDS will give you more info.

[Kingy]

Yes I agree, E grades are for UK routes as far as Im concerned.

[remus]

In practice I agree, an E grade doesn't offer anything to someone looking to climb Belly Full of Bad Berries that they wouldn't get from 13a. It's got some niche use cases though, like if you want to ask "what's are the hardest trad routes in the world?", much easier to answer that question if you've recorded everything using the same grading system.

[thomas røllins]

In practice I agree, an E grade doesn't offer anything to someone looking to climb Belly Full of Bad Berries that they wouldn't get from 13a. It's got some niche use cases though, like if you want to ask "what's are the hardest trad routes in the world?", much easier to answer that question if you've recorded everything using the same grading system.

Your climbing-history website is a fantastic resource, but I have wondered whether building the trad lists around E Grades, as if they were in global use, is really a hill you want to die on? It requires you to estimate E Grades for crack routes on which the majority of the first ascentionists and repeat ascentionists of those routes have no interest or opinion. For example, is Le Voyage (already flashed) really "E10" while Cobra Crack (which no-one has come close to flashing or onsighting) is "E9" and therefore no longer in your "hard trad" list? There are several other 5.14 cracks in North America like Stranger than Fiction of which the same applies. 

And on a related note: your trad list effectively anoints James Pearson as the "world's greatest trad climber" when AFAIK he has done very little crack climbing of note. And correspondingly seems to understate the achievements of strong crack climbers like Connor Herson or Pete Whittaker. (Not to mention Canada's reclusive Ben Harnden, who recently confessed to having done eight trad routes over 5.14 ... of which likely the least significant, The Bull, is the only one in your hard trad list. His 2022 route Bladerunner is bold 5.14c. )

[thomas røllins]

There are several other 5.14 cracks in North America like Stranger than Fiction of which the same applies.

After further checking I see that specific observation is wrong: StF is in the list.

[remus]

In practice I agree, an E grade doesn't offer anything to someone looking to climb Belly Full of Bad Berries that they wouldn't get from 13a. It's got some niche use cases though, like if you want to ask "what's are the hardest trad routes in the world?", much easier to answer that question if you've recorded everything using the same grading system.

Your climbing-history website is a fantastic resource, but I have wondered whether building the trad lists around E Grades, as if they were in global use, is really a hill you want to die on? It requires you to estimate E Grades for crack routes on which the majority of the first ascentionists and repeat ascentionists of those routes have no interest or opinion.

If not E grades then what? The nice thing with crack routes is that at least it's fairly easy to convert over using e grader (shoot me) because you know the pro situation.

For example, is Le Voyage (already flashed) really "E10" while Cobra Crack (which no-one has come close to flashing or onsighting) is "E9" and therefore no longer in your "hard trad" list? There are several other 5.14 cracks in North America like Stranger than Fiction of which the same applies.

You could argue cobra is E10 and I wouldn't argue. imo that and le voyage are likely in the same sorta grade range. Seb's flash of Le Voyage is one of the best first-go trad efforts of all time.

And on a related note: your trad list effectively anoints James Pearson as the "world's greatest trad climber" when AFAIK he has done very little crack climbing of note. And correspondingly seems to understate the achievements of strong crack climbers like Connor Herson or Pete Whittaker. (Not to mention Canada's reclusive Ben Harnden, who recently confessed to having done eight trad routes over 5.14 ... of which likely the least significant, The Bull, is the only one in your hard trad list. His 2022 route Bladerunner is bold 5.14c. )

I don't think Pete W is under represented but fair cop of Connor and Ben H, some of Connor's stuff is missing which should be showing up so I think there's a bug in the list somewhere.

[Fiend]

I agree with E grades as always.

Maybe some of the particularly hard / relentless American style cracks warrant an upgrade because the system originally didn't take into account 1 inch wide cracks that are several miles long....

[remus]

And on a related note: your trad list effectively anoints James Pearson as the "world's greatest trad climber" when AFAIK he has done very little crack climbing of note. And correspondingly seems to understate the achievements of strong crack climbers like Connor Herson or Pete Whittaker. (Not to mention Canada's reclusive Ben Harnden, who recently confessed to having done eight trad routes over 5.14 ... of which likely the least significant, The Bull, is the only one in your hard trad list. His 2022 route Bladerunner is bold 5.14c. )

I don't think Pete W is under represented but fair cop of Connor and Ben H, some of Connor's stuff is missing which should be showing up so I think there's a bug in the list somewhere.

The list we were looking at was 'hardest trad routes in the world' which is a little different to what we're discussing so I've put a new list together https://climbing-history.org/list/39/strongest-trad-climbers I've also added in some more of Ben Harnden's ascents in, most notably Blade Runner 8c/+ which he freed a couple of years ago.

[Duncan campbell]

Ooof! Putting Ron Kauk in for magic line but not Hazel Findlay? (Unless I missed her entry)

Gotta downgrade Ron’s ascent as he did it on pre-placed gear? Or is it still E10 with pre-places gear as it is 8c+?

[edshakey]

Maybe a bug because Hazel's ascent on the Magic Line page doesn't come with a grade suggestion?

Less likely after the Meltdown was mentioned and there are no suggested grades for anyone for that

[IanP]

Ooof! Putting Ron Kauk in for magic line but not Hazel Findlay? (Unless I missed her entry)

I assume this must be work in progress because it also doesn't include Babsi Zangrel and (arguably most significant) Beth Rodden for Meltdown.

[grimer]

Some cool looking stuff here on Rad Bull TV (if you scrol to related videos at the bottom) especially the Fred Beckey one

https://www.redbull.com/gb-en/films/red-bull-dual-ascent

[grimer]

Oh god not that stupid link thing :-(

[SA Chris]

lol, I literally just watched the Fred Beckley one last week. I enjoyed it, but was torn between being impressed by what he did and his dedication, and also being glad I was not in his circle of contacts, as I expect he would wind me up a bit.

[remus]

Ooof! Putting Ron Kauk in for magic line but not Hazel Findlay? (Unless I missed her entry)

I assume this must be work in progress because it also doesn't include Babsi Zangrel and (arguably most significant) Beth Rodden for Meltdown.

Sorry, total amateur move on my part...copy-pasted the code from one of the "strongest men..." lists and forgot to remove the gender filter. Should be sorted now, but very interested to hear of any ascents people think are missing.

[remus]

Some cool looking stuff here on Rad Bull TV (if you scrol to related videos at the bottom) especially the Fred Beckey one

https://www.over-caffeinated sugary drink company.com/gb-en/films/red-bull-dual-ascent

This should work

https://shorturl.at/a647R

[thomas røllins]

You could argue cobra is E10 and I wouldn't argue. imo that and le voyage are likely in the same sorta grade range.

Ditto Crack of Destiny which I believe Didier suggested was harder than Cobra. Another, possibly contentious observation, about Cobra Crack is that after eighteen years it still hasn't had a female ascent despite some very strong women attempting it for multiple seasons. Unlike Le Voyage.

[cheque]

If not E grades then what?

Sport grades for anything that’s climbed after top-rope practice.

Oh god not that stupid link thing :-(

Why no-one’s fixed this yet I don’t understand. All it does is stop us posting working links to videos. The only person who was ever in favour of it (as I understand it) hasn’t been in charge of the site for years and doesn’t even post anymore. No other soft drink company names are censored.

[duncan]

Redbull links should now work.
https://www.redbull.com/gb-en/films/dirtbag-the-legend-of-fred-beckey

[grimer]

Hmmm. For some reason I have a tremendous hankering for a high-sugar, high-caffeine sports drink now...

[haydn jones]

It's a sad day for UKB when someone can't post a link to redbull and then in a subsequent post complain about it getting auto corrected and then another person chipping in to say how is this still a thing....

Gone are the good days. 

[shark]

This is not my doing

[spidermonkey09]

Episode 3. The pace picks up!

[joel182]

Udo Neumann just put Performance Rock Climbing (1993) on his youtube channel.

[T_B]

Surprised no one has shared the recent Arc’teryx film ‘Ground Up’ about climbing El Niño on El Cap. I know these sorts of films are ten a penny thesedays, but there’s some pretty cool footage of the climbers looking fairly at their max on some of the crux pitches. The route looks flippin’ awesome - way more inspiring to me than the pure crack routes as it actually looks doable.